Holiday Self Care

Brace yourself, teachers! The holidays are upon us! So much to plan, experience, and enjoy! But since teachers are also the planners of most of the experiences in the classroom and at home, it can also be a stressful time. Just as they tell us in the opening instructions on every plane flight, place the oxygen mask on your own face before you attempt to help others. You will not be able to serve and share if your own metaphorical cup is empty. My message today is about some ways that you might consider in taking care of yourself during these always fast paced couple of months ahead.

Find some time for yourself.
I can tell you that the dishes and laundry will still be there the next time you look. Even if it's an hour later. Or the next morning. With a retired spouse, you might even find that the need to do them no longer exists when you return to them - because they're done! (I know that's something that most of you have only to dream of right now, but it may be in your future!)

With two career families raising children, it may seem super important to stick to a schedule. Fine for most of the year, but during this hectic time, why not just walk away from it all for a half-hour vacation inside your own mind. While I was teaching, I tried to carve this time out when I first got home; now I do it after dinner. Right to the couch for knitting or reading. Thirty minutes, then back to reality. It's so relaxing, and I have clinical proof that it lowers blood pressure. (Proud owner of a home blood pressure cuff here.)

Your thirty minute vacation from planning and chores can also include meditation, yoga, or exercise. Meditation is great. Darken a room, assume your position. I use lotus - criss cross applesauce - but any position that you feel comfortable in is fine. If you have a family around, seeking your attention, let them know that this is meditation time, and they are free to join you in their own practice of meditation, but not free to interrupt. Baby see, baby do - you might just be setting your children on a path to better physical and mental health for a lifetime. Who knows?

There are so many apps out there for setting the atmosphere for meditation, and Sirius radio even has two or three stations with spa music that you can use. And then, of course, there is always good old, much welcomed silence! I have discovered that total, absolute silence has its own sound. I'm sure I'm not the actual discoverer of that fact, but wow! Was I surprised when i finally took some time to pause and just listen to the silence. It has an energy all its own.

If meditation isn't your thing, try taking a walk. Walk outside for thirty minutes or so at the end of your teaching day. Do it right at school before you leave, when you first get home, or just after dinner. Dog owners already do this self-care technique every day. Walking your dog can be very much a self-care activity. I like to take walks in my neighborhood at a pace that I might use if I had a dog. I miss my dogs, but have no plans for a new puppy right now, so walking after dinner (or before in Eastern Standard plunged into darkness time) gives me a chance to see everyone else walking their dogs. Love!

Find some time to spend with friends.
Too busy getting ready for the holidays to spend time with friends? Work each other into those preparations! Have an online shopping party. Pour the wine, get out the credit cards, and boot up the laptops! Check some things off your list, and fill your soul in the way that spending time with friends always does.

Meet at a mall restaurant. Have lunch and shop together. Still getting things done, but making your life better with your besties.

Invite some friends/family over for tea or coffee and a recipe exchange. Everyone brings extra copies of their recipe for everyone else, and samples (if that's not adding extra pressure), and you are all set with some new recipes to try out on your family! And - no affiliate link here, but I just downloaded a free recipe and shopping list app called "Copy Me That". You have got to check it out! Just another little way to make your life easier. A friend told me about it when we were spending some quality time together!

Plan a getaway.
Get out those travel catalogs that seem to be in everyone's mailboxes this time of year. Plan some fantasy getaway vacations. Make a scrapbook or collage board that you can look at for a quick trip away in your mind whenever you need it throughout the year! And better yet, it may lead to the beginning of planning an actual getaway!


Introduce a new calming practice.
Never tried yoga? Tai chi? Journaling? Gratitude lists? Pick one and try adding it to your life.

I've had to add a food journal back into my life recently. (We won't discuss it here, because I hate to journal every bite that I eat, and it makes me the opposite of calm. It does keep me from eating some things though, just because I don't want to write about them. Wait - so maybe that's the point.) Whatever. I have found that adding one sentence (just.one.sentence. We can do this!) at the bottom of the journal page about something that made me me feel grateful that day really helps. It impacts my whole day because my mind wanders several times to finding that morsel of gratitude each day.

And yoga? I can't say enough good things about it and what it has done to keep me out of physical therapy after an auto accident and flareups of sciatica. The best part is the calming practice. And the studio. It's dark in there, and no one can talk to you. Aaaahhhh.....

Journaling and gratitude lists. These move in and out of my life. I'm always sorry when I come back to them that I ever left. They always forgive me and welcome me back with full benefits.

Teach your students about self-care.
Try some zen inducing activities from Rainbow City Learning to bring a calming atmosphere to your classroom, starting right now and continuing throughout the year. Zen coloring pages, gratitude journals, group activities, and yoga resources can all be fun and very helpful in calming everyone down and keeping an even flow as you travel through the rest of your school year!

Click on the word links above to try some of these resources.

Here's a free poster to get you started!

Hope you have a happy and peaceful holiday season! 

For more thoughts and talk for November, please visit these great posts. Like what you see, and want to join us? Before posting your link, please email me at retta.london@gmail.com

                          

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It's Candy O'Clock! The store shelves may be lacking some essential paper items, but they are currently chock full of Halloween candy of every description in those cute little individual bags! Trick or Treating is so much fun, but how many kids can actually eat all the candy in their haul? It's estimated that most kids will consume about 3,190 empty calories from their Trick or Treat bags. For most kids, that won't even make a dent in the stash. Here are some suggestions to make better use of the annual sugar rush and make your classroom goblins want to share!

The Legend of the Switch Witch

My head is currently spinning while trying to find out who owns the concept of the Switch Witch. Apparently, you can't copyright an idea and so the Switch Witch legend is now part of the public domain. The original Switch Witch book is available on that book selling internet giant and also at some smaller booksellers. I purchased a cute witch and book from a Colorado company (switchwitches.com) which I thought would be useful for upper elementary students. This book talks about the magic of Switchcraft. 

The legend was originally created to help a diabetic toddler to see another use for the trick or treat candy that she couldn't eat. According to legend, various Switch Witches travel all over the world before Halloween. They will exchange your Halloween candy for other fun toys/gifts. They watch over you in a way similar to the Elf on a Shelf concept.

My classroom application: My Rainbow City classroom always had a store (We called it the Rainbow City Boutique!) open on Fridays. Kids could exchange classroom dollars earned through good behavior and work efforts for school supplies, handmade items by their classmates, or materials to make their own items to sell. More about how this economy worked can be found here. 

Whether you have a classroom shop or not, you can place a cute witch doll on a table next to a box which can be sealed (like a plastic storage container with lid). Our school was on the edge of a forest. Forests have mice. Need I say more? Didn't think so. 

After Halloween, your students can bring their wrapped Halloween candy to school and trade it in for whatever you (The Switch Witch) decide to offer in exchange. You can use a witch doll or dress up yourself. I'm pretty sure that a parent might be willing to dress up and volunteer for this job as well!

For a followup writing activity, ask your students to write a letter to the Switch Witch about what they would like in exchange for their candy! Find that activity here: 

What will you do with all the candy you collect? Save it and read on!

Harriet's Halloween

Many years ago, an AIMS (Activities in Math and Science) activity was published in their journal using the picture book Harriet's Halloween Candy. The story was about an anthropomorphic dog who didn't want to share her Halloween Candy. The activity was all about sorting according to different attributes such as chocolate/not chocolate, individually wrapped/package wrapped, plastic wrappers/paper wrappers, by color, by ones they like/don't like, etc. 

Upper elementary kids should be able to come up with four different ways to sort their stash. I made a sorting page for you to use below. You're welcome.

After sorting, my class would make goody bags to be handed out at the local food pantry as a treat for homeless kids or those unable to trick or treat in their own neighborhoods. Some senior citizens centers will take these donations also. 

Cute graphics on this page are from Melonheadz.

Getting to Know Us Again

Depending on how quickly you opened your room and got students back to school, you may or may not have tried this fun Morning Meeting activity. You can play it with Skittles, M&Ms, or any wrapped small candies. I've played it with pennies, and some teachers use toilet paper squares. As students enter the circle, ask them to "Take as many" as they need. As you go around the circle, each child has to say something about themself for each of the number of pieces they've chosen. 

This game can have so many adaptations: Say something nice about a classmate for each piece, say something new that has happened in your life for each piece, tell something new you learned in class last week for each one, use them to tell the steps of something that you know how to cook or build or create.

So many ways to reacquaint ourselves as a classroom community!

Poetry Writing

Here's a funny and fun poem for Halloween from Shel Silverstein's book, Every Thing On It. The cute graphics on this page are from the amazing Glitter Meets Glue. You're welcome again!

Kids can write their own poems, using this as a model. Who do they think invented Trick or Treating? They can also write Five Senses Poems or another poetry form about Halloween. 

STEAM

From Saving Sam (or Fred or...) to Pumpkin Catapults and Pretzel Stick Bridges, there are so many ways to use candy in your STEM/STEAM activities. If you've collected candy from the Switch Witch suggestion, you can use it again and again to supplement your Maker Space and STEM/STEAM activities.

Here's a fun one from my Stepping Into STEAM resource. 

Notes and Awards

Pay it forward! Use some of your "switchcrafted" stash to attach to thank you notes for PTA or Staff Appreciation days. Some years, we have sent care packages to our troops. It is also fun to attach candy to Clean Desk Awards. 

 Candy Book Discussions

 I have used M & M Book discussion cards during Reading time. Wow! Not only was I able to have 10 book conferences in less than one hour, but I could really tell how deeply those books had been read. 

Worked with two multi-level groups of 5 each. Students randomly selected an M&M from their Halloween-sized bags (perfect time of year to try this), and told the group about their book as the prompt directed.

 
Did not hear one "I pass." or one "I don't know." The conversation flowed, and the students were thrilled to keep their cute laminated M & M bookmarks to prepare for their next discussion.  Eight more students signed up for conferences for the next day, and several were heard as they packed to go home that they couldn't wait to get back into their independent reading books that night.
A fun day interacting with my readers! Hope you'll try it!  

For a convenient download of the  pages shown above, just click here! (No longer free, but just a dollar! Really! Come on!)

ALL of the ideas in this post, and many more can be found in my Halloween Bundle. Save yourself some planning time, and enjoy the celebration along with your class! Just click below!

BIG NEWS!

If I can do anything else to help make your job easier this year, please let me know in the comments below! If I use your idea for a new blog post, you will win a TpT $10 gift card. If I create a new resource for Rainbow City Learning based on your idea, you will win a free copy of that resource to use in your classroom! (Note: all comments are reviewed before appearing on my blog. It may take a few hours for your comment to appear! Thanks for your patience!)

Wishing you and your class a safe and fun Halloween this year!

For more October thoughts on teaching, be sure to check out the posts below by the amazing bloggers in Teacher Talk. 

If you would also like to be a part of Teacher Talk, we are a group of teacher bloggers who share posts that are heavy on the ideas with just a little selling of our educational materials at TeachersPayTeachers.com.  For more information about joining The Best of Teacher Entrepreneurs Marketing Cooperative, go to https://bit.ly/3o7D1Dv.  Feel free to email me at retta.london@gmail.com if you have any questions. 

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Heading into Pumpkin Spice Season

 "I'm so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers." (Lucy Maud Montgomery in Anne of Green Gables) A longish title for a blog post, and yet a perfect thought to begin each day in October. To Anne, October is a clear message from nature that things change, and change is a good thing. Your new-in-August-or-September class should just be settling into routines by now and realizing that every day brings new adventures in learning. Maybe you have changed grades, or subject focus, or schools. This year, in any case, should be an adventure in building relationships with your students. Even a looping class shows up on the first day very different than they were when they left for summer break. We change every day as long as we keep living.

What does October make you think of? Pumpkin spice everything? As a non-fan of pumpkin spice, I am always up for other new flavors from my favorite coffee place. The caramel apple one called to me this month, although I have pretty quickly returned to oat milk flat white. Decaf. I'm much too exciting already for caffeine. In my part of the country, October never disappoints with the fiery displays of color from trees all around my community. And best of all? The mosquitoes are gone. I know many of your students have Halloween and the planning of their costumes on their minds. You might even be planning your own costume and those of your family.

October is a cozy kind of month to me. I dream of long lazy stretches of time, knitting, painting, and reading. I can still walk outdoors, but the time spent inside when I return is much more enticing. This October, I have a fresh new novel from each of several of my favorite authors to explore: Jodi Picoult, Ellen Hilderbrand, Jamie Ford, Celeste Ng, and Colleen Hoover. Here's a list of new books for middle grades that you might want to explore as you have reading conferences with your students this fall. 

Nothing suggests fall coziness in the classroom more to me than a read-aloud. In my opinion, kids are never too young or too old for a good read-aloud. For October, I recommend Anne of Green Gables and the more contemporary Each Little Bird That Sings by Deborah Wiles. Comfort Snowberger  is a character that your students and you will not forget. 

Some suggestions to try out in your classroom before October ends, and to continue into the rest of Autumn:

Around the Campfire

Try this idea for Morning Meeting, Read-aloud time, Author's Chair, or Poetry Share. Build a "campfire" on a paper plate base from empty toilet paper or paper towel rolls and crumpled tissue paper. Sit in a circle around it. Students could have their own individual "logs" to add to the fire when they add a reading of their own work or when they add an observation, compliment, or suggestion to the conversation. I purchased an electric "campfire" from a local  fireplace shop, but here's a picture of one that you could easily build:

October Stations

Stations Day was always a time my students looked forward to. As a fourth grade team, we had a stations day each week, with a special one each month. Of course, our October Stations addressed our curriculum standards, but with a focus on Fall. Try a liquid measurement station with apple cider as the liquid. Try a STEM/STEAM activity using miniature candies like the one found here. For Halloween-focused stations during Halloween week, don't miss this bundle from Rainbow City Learning!

Stations are much like Centers, but with the addition of volunteer helpers at each Station. I like using parent or community volunteers to run the Stations, but older students from other classrooms can also do a great job. Volunteers help when supply management is a little more challenging. 

Explore Change as a Theme

It's been said that the only one who actually likes change is a baby with a soiled diaper. I disagree. IMO we all can learn to embrace change. Change means that we are growing and learning and becoming (hopefully) better versions of ourselves. There are so many ways to focus on change in your classroom. Explore the states of matter, chemical and physical change, and the way characters change from beginning to end of a book/story. Look at the ways other characters become a force for change to the main character. Begin to look at the changes each of us goes through during the school year. We are like beautiful butterflies, emerging from a gloppy pile inside the chrysalis. Journals, time capsules, and portfolio collections can help us to save and savor the beauty of change. 

This resource can help your students to document and then look back on the changes they see in themselves during the year. 

I hope you'll use the rest of your October to lead your students on their journey to embracing change. Introduce them to new scientists, authors, artists, and poets this month! And introduce them to my actual favorite quote from Anne of Green Gables: "The world calls them its singers and poets and artists and storytellers; but they are just people who have never forgotten the way to fairyland." 

My wish for you is that you never forget the way to fairyland. Just as working with young people all day will keep you young, remembering the way inside your own imagination will accomplish that as well. I'm so glad I live in a world where there are teachers like you!

For more October teaching inspiration, be sure to take at look at some of the posts below. If you are a blogger and interested in joining Teacher Talk, please contact me at retta.london@gmail.com and I'll explain how to get started!

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The blog fairies have been here and thought that I should write a post about how to ease into the new school year, but honestly... I ate some suspect spinach on Friday while lunching out with a dear friend, and this has not been a great weekend so far. I told the blog fairies to kindly visit someone else today. I decided to take my own advice as detailed below, and squeeze every last drop of summer pleasure into my heart and into my memories (as soon as I am able to leave my bathroom).I hope you enjoy reading this oldie but goodie post, and get a little more summer under your belt to last all year long!

Aaaaahhh....August! August is the Sunday night of a teacher's year. We are looking forward to our learning and teaching days to come, yet longing for just a little more summer. We are making plans, thinking about setting up our classrooms, and yet feeling the need to sink our toes in the sand once more, watch just one more Netflix binge, or read one more beach book. It's a feeling that I still get as a retired teacher. I feel the butterflies in my stomach, find myself wondering who is on my class list, and when I can finally get into my room to work. Those feelings never go away, even as I realize that those days are over for me.

So teachers, as we move through August together, I think I know a little of the approach-avoidance feelings you are experiencing. As memories of August past flood my brain, I hope I can offer a few ideas to make your transition back to class easier! Of course, if your district has already returned for the new school year, you probably have a tip or two to offer us already. I hope you'll share in the comments!

Just because  the stores are shelving school supplies earlier and earlier each year, that doesn't mean that you have to spring into action and start gathering. The shelves will be restocked and more and better deals will appear as we get closer to the actual opening of school.

Don't be so anxious to get into your room. It will still be there if you choose to spend a few extra vacation days with friends and/or family. It's usually a struggle to gain access early in August if you are a Labor Day district like ours, so why not wait until the school is actually ready for you to dig in and transform your space?

For years, I stayed away from Labor Day gatherings, choosing instead to make my desk name tags, type up my revised class list for the twentieth time, and pack "Welcome to my Class" bags. Looking back, I think I could have enjoyed the Labor Day fun and still had a great first week.  Savor every last delicious moment this year and then retrieve it to recall on a long and cold winter day.

AT HOME

Have you stressed out over what to wear to school each day? Consider spending a little August time cleaning your closet, donating items you never wear, and shopping for a "capsule wardrobe". The idea of a basic wardrobe of fewer pieces that can be mixed in multiple ways really isn't a fad. It's been around under many names since the 70's. You can trust me. I was there. I didn't heed the advice, but I heard it. Looking back, I realize how much easier my mom life and teaching life could have been with this teeny tiny change in habit. If you have a sparse closet filled with mix and match pieces that you love love love, getting dressed in the morning will be snap!

Will you miss your summer gym time? Bike rides? Long walks? Yoga class? Make a plan now on how to make exercise a part of your school day. A lifestyle modification that worked for me was to go to sleep an hour earlier than I would have liked to so that I could get up an hour earlier to work out. When my children were really young, I made this a two hour difference so I could be up in time to exercise for an hour, shower and shampoo, and be dressed and ready to leave for work before waking my girls. Decide what you would like to accomplish in the morning and work backwards to adjust your bedtime. Adjusting to an earlier bedtime is a life-changer!

Worried about having great family meals ready after working each day? The Instant Pot is a miracle machine! Dinner ready in no time at all! (Unless you choose a recipe that uses the Instant Pot as a slow cooker. I did this once - the first time I used mine. We ended up waiting 3 hours for dinner instead of 30 minutes! Hahaha! Now I check the cooking times before getting out the ingredients!) Use a lazy August evening or two gathering recipes to try in the fall.

Stressful to pack lunches in the morning? Make a plan to batch pack those meals in a quick weekend hour. Snack boxes, bags, mason jars, and bento boxes make great containers for pack ahead meals.

AT SCHOOL

Does your room have to be Instagram perfect before the students arrive? Why not ask for their ideas on furniture arrangement and groupings? Have some basic bulletin boards to set the stage for students to contribute their work. I have found over and over again that students who feel a sense of ownership  in their classroom will show much more respect for the rules, materials, and equipment.

Would you like your Meet the Teacher event to run more smoothly? Have a few activities ready for kids to complete, like an All About Me page to display for the first day of school. Have a brochure ready for parents describing your philosophy and plans for curriculum, along with contact information. Keep it as simple as possible. I loved using a trifold brochure. Try really hard not to plan a heavy room setup work day on the same day as Meet the Teacher.

Here's a bulletin board idea: Make signs with FAQ and answers and post them all around your classroom. Very helpful for parents and for students. Less for you to explain over and over as the first days roll on.

Will you use more Project Based Learning? Would you like to try Math Centers or a Maker Space? What's your plan to build your classroom community? All of these ideas and more are soooo much easier to contemplate away from the scene of all the excitement. Do a little reading about the top item or two on your list. Subscribe to a professional journal or blog related to the topic. Join a Facebook group of like minded teachers who are going to try out the same new practice. Start small and grow your practice as you feel more comfortable.

I can't say enough about how the simple act of writing quietly for fifteen or twenty minutes each day will bring balance and serenity to your life. It will provide insight later to what happened on a frustrating day and will provide memories that will bring a smile to your face for years to come. 

When I started my journal writing at the very end of each school day, my students were wondering what I was up to. Was I writing about them? Was it good stuff? You could hear a pin drop and minds working as my sweeties got all reflective in their own journals too!

Get together with your teaching besties at lunch or at the end of the day to just laugh out loud at some of the outrageous, cute, or even challenging things that will be a part of every day. Try laughter instead of commiserating as often as you can. Humor feels much better than frustration and anger every time!

Some teaching besties and I have started getting together (from across the country by phone) each Sunday night to laugh about some of the things that have stressed us out as teachers. It's the best cure ever for the Sunday night butterflies. We have had so much fun laughing at ourselves and the overwhelming tower of things we have taken soooo seriously that we decided to start a podcast! We hope you will join us by listening and by interacting with us on our Facebook page We Teach So Hard. Because we know that you teach so hard too! I hope this teaching year is the best one ever for you!

We Teach So Hard is currently available on several platforms. As an iPhone podcast addict, I of course am THRILLED to see it on iTunes. Meanwhile, meet up with us here:

Podcast on iTunes   Podcast on Anchor     

    

For more ideas as you start your new school year, please check out the fabulous bloggers of Teacher Talk! 

If you would also like to be a part of Teacher Talk, we are a group of teacher bloggers who share posts

that are heavy on the ideas with just a little selling of our educational materials at    TeachersPayTeachers.com.  For more information about joining The Best of Teacher Entrepreneurs Marketing Cooperative, go to https://bit.ly/3o7D1Dv.  Feel free to email me at retta.london@gmail.com if you have any questions. 

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Summer is Almost Here

  Summer is almost here! Can you feel it just ahead? This is the time to pack up your room, pass out your Super Summer Kits, collect your fabulous teacher gifts, and collect lots of hugs, smiling through your tears. Don't cry. I'm here to tell you from the other side of your teacher life that your students loved you and appreciated all you did for them this year. When they look back on their school years, the older they get, the more they will realize what you did for them. Many of them will even find ways to tell you. I promise. 

As teacher-astronaut Christa McAuliffe once said, "I touch the future. I teach." As
you close up shop for this year and start to plan for next year, never forget that in all you do and say and plan, you touch the future every day. What an awesome superpower to have!

Reaching out into the future, you may find an idea or two in this bundle from Rainbow City Learning. The Summer Activity Calendar is a must! Lots of ideas for other add ins. 

What was the Super Summer Kit? It was simply a large ziplock bag or white 8 1/2 x 11 envelope filled with an activity calendar, a list of books "Recommended in Rainbow City" by other students, a goodbye letter from me filled with memories of our year together, and hopes I held for them as they grew up and away, fun writing suggestions like nature observations and different ways to make fun books and journals, a list of fun local day trips and summer field trips, and a summer bucket list brainstorming activity called "I Would if I Could". Kids used these throughout the summer with no future deadlines or pressure. Some even took them to camp for some downtime suggestions to share with bunkmates. I made a colorful and personalized cover page for each one, and loved having this unique gift to greet them on the last day of school as important as the backpack bags I greeted them with on the first day!

Since I have now have evidence that so many are hugely successful adults, and since those who looped with me or returned to a classroom of a teaching friend that I could check in with came back refreshed and even smarter, I have to conclude that the Super Summer Kit was enough. The thick worksheet books that parents used to clamor for at our local book shop every May and June seemed daunting and uninteresting to me. What kid wants an assignment to complete every day all summer long, in  the interest of "keeping skills sharp"? Kids need their vacation and down time just as much as we adults do to refresh, recharge, and renew our interest in learning. I always found that the activities that I selected for that kit (most found right here in this bundle) were a "just right" approach to summer learning.

So, if you are lamenting the end of the school year, even while looking forward to your own summer plans, and want to send your babies off with a fun and learning filled kit for their summer, I hope you'll check out these summer resources from Rainbow City Learning for a happy slide through summer and into the next school year. And don't worry, they're still making more! (Love and kisses to Joanie, now in Heaven. She always told me not to cry on the last day because they were making more (kids) and when they were ready, they'd send them!)

For more summer inspiration, please check out the fabulous bloggers of Teacher Talk! This is our last linkup until August. Posts in this linkup are limited to Teacher Talk member bloggers only.

If you would also like to be a part of Teacher Talk, we are a group of teacher bloggers who share posts that are heavy on the ideas with just a little selling of our educational materials at TPT. For more information about joining The Best of Teacher Entrepreneurs Marketing Cooperative, go to https://bit.ly/3o7D1Dv.  Feel free to email me at retta.london@gmail.com if you have any questions. 

                                         

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Narrative Nonfiction Brings History to Life

 

I wanted to be a teacher as long as I can remember, even before I actually attended school. I will admit though to several side journeys as I grew. My uncle campaigned pretty hard throughout my high school and college years to study law and join his firm. Once his own children were exploring their own future careers, he stepped back. Two of his three children actually did become lawyers, and I was free once again to continue moving toward my dream of working in my own classroom. 

In college, I became extremely interested in sociology and archeology, and briefly considered a career as an archeologist. Dirty fingernails along with a dislike for working outside in extremes of weather told me that this was not a good choice for me. I believe that my intense interest in these fields of study helped me overall to be a better teacher. I never had to pretend to be excited about digging into the study of a new piece of nonfiction. I was all in from the beginning, and sometimes needed to calm down a little before presenting the lesson to my students! 

I  came across an article recently that detailed the discovery of Harriet Tubman's childhood home in Dorchester County, Maryland. The area is becoming swampier as the water level rises and the land is sinking, but when the manager of The National Blackwater Wildlife Refuge learned that Ben Ross' (Harriet Tubman's father) cabin may have been on their newly acquired land, she called in the archeologists! Their first find was a coin from 1808, the year that Harriet Tubman's parents were married. After digging over a thousand pits, the team discovered many datable artifacts, such as "...bricks, 19th century pottery with distinct design patterns, rusty nails, a button, and old documents". Historical records tell us that Harriet Tubman lived in this cabin as a child, and again as she planned her strategy of the Underground Railroad in 1849. While not finding an actual homestead or even a chimney, this find was exciting, and pulled me back to a longtime favorite book of mine.

Teaching Home Place by Crescent Dragonwagon (IKR? Her real name!) was always one of those "calm down first" moments for me. I love this author and the gentle and tender way she lets her story unfurl. Also majorly in love with the illustrations of Jerry Pinkney. A special book to treasure on several levels. Past and present melt into each other as watercolors do when you are working wet on wet and colors begin to merge. A family on a hike through the woods (how many times have we all done this as a family outing ?) finds daffodils growing in the wild, but no house nearby. They search further and find part of a chimney standing by itself. A little digging in the ground unearths a blue glass marble, a nail, part of a china plate, a horseshoe, a small yellow bottle, and a doll's arm. These artifacts help them to tell each other the story of a long ago family living right in the spot where they stood, having chicken for dinner, singing on the front porch, and even complaining about the heat on a summer day long before central air! If I had my hands on this book as a child, I might have veered off onto the archeology path despite the dirt and heat! Don't miss sharing this one with your kids!

Teaching Narrative Nonfiction is really much more intuitive than many of us think when we first approach it. Which type of writing is a nonfiction narrative? It is simply nonfiction delivered in narrative structure rather than expository. It is all true, but told as a story unfolds. Crescent Dragonwagon tells the story of a house and family as they lived circa 1900. It's recommended for grades K-3, but I used it with grades 4 and 5 for years. Fourth and fifth graders are much more likely to be able to use it as a mentor text for writing more narrative nonfiction.

A favorite followup writing activity to Home Place would be to bring a photo of an artifact from home, or an artifact discovered on a walk, and tell the story of a person or family who might have used that item in another time in history. Without using artifacts, you could also look at a particular time in history and have your fourth or fifth graders tell about that time from the viewpoint of a kid their age at that time. (I would steer clear of using this idea to study slavery or other culturally sensitive issues.) 

If you use The One and Only Ivan in your reading curriculum, there is a narrative nonfiction companion book called Ivan, the Remarkable True Story of the Shopping Mall Gorilla, also by Katharine Applegate. It would be very interesting to discuss the narrative structure of each. 

As a reading addict, I always had a book or two up my sleeve that I was reading to tell my students about as we discussed their books. I usually did not tell them the title. No need for them to read an adult book that may not be suitable in other ways, but only to show that authors who write for all ages use many of the same structures, elements, and storytelling techniques. The story of Home Place takes me back to a recently read book, The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner. A tourist in London goes "mudlarking" and finds a mysterious blue bottle on the shore of the Thames. We then embark on parallel stories of the tourist trying to trace the history of the bottle and a history told of a time when apothecaries sometimes prepared secret potion poisons for abused women to dispatch their abusers. I would share only the story of the bottle find and the historical search that ensued, of course! If you haven't read this book yet, you might want to add it to your own summer reading list. So good!

Some suggested narrative nonfiction texts (in addition to Ivan) are: Camp Panda by Catherine Thimmesh, A Seal Named Patches by Roxanne Beltran, The Boo Boos that Changed the World by Barry Wittenstein, and Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterly. This list could go on for pages and pages.

For more ideas on teaching Narrative Nonfiction, be sure to check out these resources from Rainbow City Learning on TpT!

If you would also like to be a part of Teacher Talk, we are a group of teacher bloggers who share posts that are heavy on the ideas with just a little selling of our educational materials at TeachersPayTeachers.com.  For more information about joining The Best of Teacher Entrepreneurs Marketing Cooperative, go to https://bit.ly/3o7D1Dv.  Feel free to email me at retta.london@gmail.com if you have any questions. 

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What Are You Reading this Month?

 

"It's always something." (Gilda Radner as Roseanne Rosannadanna) Every day that we show up at school, ready to learn, is a cause for celebration. "...and everywhere was a song and a celebration." (Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. Woodstock, baby.) Seriously, teachers, we can find something to celebrate in class every single day. The biggest celebration, of course, is when the imaginary light bulbs flash with new learning, with a newly converted reader for life, budding author, artist, mathematician, researcher, or maker. As teachers, we are part of those amazing moments all year long. And yet, if we seek other celebrations to bring a learning theme to our students, the calendar is filled with them. Here's year-long resource for an author birthday focus every month.
                
Read Across America Day was originally conceived to celebrate the birthday of Dr. Seuss. You might have been wearing out your "Cat in the Hat" striped chapeau for all the Marches for as long as you've been teaching. Maybe your school focuses on Dr. Seuss, or maybe you just enjoy that celebration in your classroom. Maybe your own teacher tied a red bow around her neck every March, and the memories are filled with warm fuzzies. Or...maybe...you are ready for a new idea?

Did you know that Leo Dillon's birthday is March 2 also?  With his wife, Diane, Leo Dillon was the author/illustrator of forty beloved children's books. Many of the books will bring the concepts of diversity and world peace into your classroom. What a beautiful segue from February is Black History Month! Why not celebrate March is Reading Month this year with a fresh focus?

A favorite Dillon book of mine is If Kids Ran the World. My students were so fortunate to have the chance to meet this gentle and lovely couple before Leo's death in 2012, when they visited our school.  The mentoring for our future authors and illustrators was off the charts! If Kids Ran the World was the book they were working on at the time of Leo's passing.

In addition to the beautiful illustrations and words showing how the world would be a better place if we all cared  for others in the way these children do, this book effortlessly becomes a mentor text. This ready to teach resource from Rainbow City Learning will show you how. Happy Birthday, Leo Dillon!

Some other authors whose work will make for great sharing and inspiration any time of the year: Patricia Polacco, Eve Bunting, and Jacqueline Woodson. These are a few of my favorites, and my students have enjoyed many lessons for reading and writing led off by the works of these writers. 

Try The Bee Tree by Patricia Polacco to see how the author's own mother was encouraged to love reading!

Share a read-aloud of The Wretched Stone by Chris Van Alsburg to prompt a discussion of all the things we might enjoy if we give up a little screen time. 

Of course, no month-long celebration is complete without a few official school-wide or grade-wide or even class-wide activities. Some of my favorites:

Hold a Read-In

In no way should this be confused with a clean your desk, grade papers, and enter data day. Wipe that thought from your mind. It's tempting for sure, but a read-in day where you participate right along with the kids is a golden opportunity to encourage a lifelong love of reading (like yours!). Only you can be the role model for that in your classroom. Sleeping bags, blankies, jammies, and pillows optional! My kids always liked making little fort areas under the desks for uninterrupted reading bliss!

Who doesn't love a Parade?

Ask your students to bring in their Radio Flyer or Little Tykes wagons to use as float carriers for a Parade of Books! (Think Macy's Thanksgiving or Disney any day, or The Rose Bowl Parade, but with books!)  Kids work in teams to create a float display (think giant diorama!) of a book. The team members dress as some of the characters as they accompany their float in a parade for school and community!

Spotlight on Books

Create a display with a fun place to leave comments/reviews about a book that the class shared as a class novel, book club choice, or read-aloud. Place a book cover in the center of the display, and kids write comments all around. Examples of fun places to leave comments: black construction paper with colored chalks, small white boards with wipe-off markers, plexiglass with window markers, fabric with glitter pens. I know your kids can  help you think of more! 

Recommended in Rainbow City

That's what we called ours, anyway! Start a weekly or monthly newsletter or blog section where kids can review books they have read and loved. It's a great resource for your students to clip and keep on hand for when they are browsing for new books to read. 

Book Trailers

Use your technology (iMovie, Windows Movie Maker, your favorite movie creator, or just your phones) to have your students create exciting trailers to "advertise" their favorite books. So many resources, directions, and examples of book trailers for kids in this post. (Just click on the director below!)

I loved sharing ideas for March is Reading Month with my podcasting friends, Tracy, Deann, and Kathie. Tune in to "We Teach So Hard" Episode 28 to hear what we came up with!

Happy, happy March! Hope you get to read something you love this month, too!

Read more about it!

March is Reading Month

Great Books to Use with Your Social Studies Curriculum

Celebrate Reading Month!

3 Ways to Keep Your Sanity for March is Reading Month

For more great ideas for the month ahead, be sure to visit all the blogs of Teacher Talk!

If you would also like to be a part of Teacher Talk, we are a group of teacher bloggers who share posts

that are heavy on the ideas with just a little selling of our educational materials (to make your teacher life easier) at TeachersPayTeachers.com.  For more information about joining The Best of Teacher Entrepreneurs Marketing Cooperative, go to https://bit.ly/3o7D1Dv.  Feel free to email me at retta.london@gmail.com if you have any questions. 

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